Jordan Times
Tuesday, September 7, 1999
House slashes controversial article from
amendments to draft press law
By Dima Hamdan
AMMAN — The Lower House of Parliament on Monday went beyond the government's recommendations and slashed a controversial article from the draft amendments to the press law, which placed vaguely worded restrictions on 14 items.
Deputies also rejected tighter proposals by the House's National Guidance Committee, which was accused by one lawmaker of being “more Catholic than the Pope.”
The majority of deputies voted in favour of cancelling article 37, which constitutes a ban on 14 topics including articles critical of the King and the Royal family, disclosing information on the Jordan Armed Forces, harming national unity, criticising leaders of Arab, Islamic or friendly nations, and articles criticising the judiciary.
The government's draft proposed cancelling only five of those provisions.
Most lawmakers, who considered journalism to be a “fourth authority,” argued that such provisions are already mentioned in other legislation, and that journalism must not be subject to strict monitoring if it is expected to disclose the truth.
Deputy Khalil Hadadin (Amman, Third District) angered some lawmakers when he said that journalism's role in monitoring the country's affairs is even bigger than the deputies' role.
“Journalism is one of the monitoring tools in the country. It should not be deprived from expressing its opinion and from criticising, and those who feel they were harmed by journalists can resort to the courts,” he told the assembly.
Deputy Fawaz Zo'bi (Irbid) seconded Hadadin's argument, on grounds that it was the media who exposed the IPC pipeline scandal last year.
Other deputies, however, insisted that provisions in other legislation were insufficient to hold journalists accountable for breaches of law and ethical standards.
“In some legislation, publishing an article [that contradicts the provisions] does not meet the penalty requirements, and so the journalist is not immediately incriminated,” said Deputy Osama Malkawi (Irbid).
Others also said that past examples of sensational reporting necessitate some restrictions.
“Journalists have slandered our economy with their [reporting] and sensational headlines, and this prompted other countries to cease the import of our products,” said Deputy Abdul Razzaq Ensour (Balqa). “It should be clearly stated that journalists are banned from writing anything that harms the national economy and hinders access to the international market,” Ensour said.
However, cancelling the article, which was seen by lawmakers as a “positive gesture,” alarmed some journalists because the same provisions, such as disclosing a secret document, are punishable by more serious penalties in the Penal Code.
“We wanted the provisions to be cancelled, but we also wanted to add an article saying that journalists cannot be imprisoned for any violations mentioned in other legislation,” said JPA under secretary Nidal Mansour.
“Some of these provisions are punishable by long-term imprisonment, or even life sentences.”
But Deputy Mahmoud Kharabsheh (Balqa) said there was no need for panic because deputies, in essence, have reduced penalties that could be imposed on journalists.
“Even when those provisions existed, anyone could demand that a journalist be prosecuted according to the Penal Code, which means that journalists were subject to more than one penalty,” he told the Jordan Times.
“In all cases, the final ruling is in the hands of the court, and a journalist can refute the accusations.”
Apart from the cancelled provisions, article 39 bans newspapers from publishing information on investigations of any case unless authorised by the general prosecutor, but they can publish court hearings unless prohibited by the court.
The committee also failed to maintain the original penalty for violating article 39 — ranging from JD10,000-5,000 — and the majority of lawmakers approved the government's proposal to reduce them to JD5,000-1,000.
They also approved a reduction of penalties on periodicals from JD500 to JD100.
Committee chairman Raji Haddad (Irbid), defended the committee's decision on grounds that there was no reason that a journalist should not be punished.
“If a journalist commits a violation and is prosecuted in court, why shouldn't he be punished according to this legislation?”
The House also agreed to reduce the minimum capital for non-daily periodicals from JD100,000 to 50,000, despite calls by some lawmakers to further reduce it to JD15,000, and calls by others to cancel the criterion altogether.
“There is no reason for such financial restrictions. The [determination] of a publication's capital should be left for the Companies Law, otherwise, we will be imposing more restrictions on journalism,” said Kharabsheh, also a committee member.
Both deputies Nayef Mawla (Amman, Third District) and Sa'ad Hayel Srour (North Bedouins) said that stipulating high capital has failed to serve the government's purpose.
“The government tried to raise the capital, in the past, in order to force some publications to close down, but it failed to do so,” Mawla said.
“Past experiences have proved that capital restrictions have never changed the situation [by reducing the number of non-daily periodicals],” Srour said.
“Therefore, let those publications handle the responsibility of determining their own capital.”
On the other hand, most lawmakers rejected the government's proposal to cancel article 5, which states that “publications should respect the truth and refrain from publishing anything that contradicts the principles of freedom, national responsibility, human rights or the values of the Arab and Islamic nation.”
Although several deputies criticised the clause and said it constituted preaching and was open to broad interpretation, Prime Minister Abdur Ra'uf S. Rawabdeh did not defend the government's decision, saying it was insignificant whether the article stays or goes.
“I agreed with the association [the Jordanian Press Association] to defend the bill, if they agreed that it represents their point of view and mine,” Rawabdeh told the assembly.
“But they breached this agreement, and the law is now in your hands. This article might be a preaching one, but several articles in our legislation are also preaching, so keeping this article or cancelling it does not matter.”
Although the JPA acknowledged that the draft has introduced significant amendments, board members insisted it fell short on meeting their demands in several crucial issues.